One boy among 20,000 children surrounded by Vladimir Putin’s invaders was saved by his mother just days before he was sent to Russia for forced adoption.
Kirill Sakalo, 12, was brought along with 80 others after being told they were going on a picnic to the coast.
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Desperate mother Natalia tried in vain for five months to track him down until a charity found him. Crimean people the inn where he was being held.
Save Ukraine arranged passports for Natalia, 42, and Kirill, and planned and financed her 6,000-mile round trip that spanned four countries and two time zones.
In normal times, it would be a five-hour drive from Kherson – occupied on the first day of the war – to Yevpateriya. Instead it took six days.
Natalia traveled from Kherson – now liberated – to the capital Kyiv, where she boarded a train to Poland.
Next is Minsk, in Belarus, and a flight to Moscow.
Natalia and other worried parents then made the 1,200-mile trek to Krasnodar, and across the bombed Kerch Bridge to Russian-annexed Crimea.
She reunited with Kirill on April 3 – and it was just in time.
Three more days will mark six months since Kirill left home and he has been told that under Russian law it will make him eligible to participate. Compulsory adoption.
Unable to hold back her tears, Natalia told The Sun: “At first, I didn’t recognize him. He’s matured a lot, he’s very tall and his hair is as long as a rock star.
“Holding you again is the best feeling in the world.”
The group returned with 31 children – bringing the total so far rescued by Save Ukraine from Russian soil to 96.
Tragically, the two children had to be left behind because their grandmother passed away of natural causes on April 2 during the last leg of their journey.
Save Ukraine said the camp authorities refused to hand over the children.
The Sakalo family’s nightmare began in October after Kirill went on a two-week field trip for students aged 6 to 16.
The teachers texted that they were staying for a few more days – then a few more. The four teachers left one by one.
On the days when Kirill was allowed to use his cell phone, he asked Natalia and Tatiana, 73, to take him home. He had never spent a night away before.
Kirill was later transferred to a boarding house in Luchysty. Classes were taught in Russian and he was asked to sing the Russian national anthem in front of visiting television crews.
“They were always punishing us – forcing us to go in circles for hours,” he said.
The man in charge was wearing armor and helmet, even though they were 100 miles from the front line.
Kirill recalls one day the man announced, “Your parents don’t want you. We are sending you to Russia with new ones.
Meanwhile, Natalia and Tatiana frantically seek help.
The troops that had occupied Kherson were forced to flee and Russian guns were opening fire in their vicinity.
All but two families in their apartment complex have left, but Natalia and Tatiana dare not move.
At the camp, Kirill hatches a perilous escape plan that involves climbing over walls, avoiding checkpoints, and blasting landmines by throwing bricks.
He called Tatiana, who convinced him to move on.
Now they share a one-room bed in a makeshift shelter in Kiev. “We don’t have much, but we have each other, we are together,” Natalia said.
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